This layout is interesting because of the ¾ inch flap fold that you make on the main panel which allows your back card base to show through. I thought about embellishing the back panel but I thought there was already enough going on with the Perhaps paper and the 8, yes 8, layers on the focal image.

Spring Dragonfly:

A little more about the main part of the focal image. The pieces for this were built from an awesome stamp from Innovative Stamp Creations that is a magnifying class with a dragonfly. The flowers and the wings going over the edge are not part of the image. The layers are as follows:Stamped flowers on white CSStamped magnifying glass with dragonfly on transparencyStamped/embossed magnifying glass again on Perhaps paperStamped the wings (separate stamp) on transparency

The flowers were colored with Prismacolor and Gamsol, the sky with watercolor crayons. The wings were colored with permanent pens and then painted white with acrylic paints. The paint makes the color on the wings pop!

Here is something funny that I discovered today - I am good at sewing strait lines - even going around corners (see the strait line on the long strip). I had a really hard time sewing to make it look messy on purpose (the ovals). I wanted this to look messy to help fill in the blank space.

Tuesday, April 29, 2008

This is a card I would refer to as - Make it Work - it’s not as I originally pictured it. I started with Crayon resist on the swirl background, butterfly and a heart… After making the pieces and trying to place it together it was too black… So…hmmm what’s a girl to do? As Tim Gund from Project Runway whispers in my ear his tag line - Make it work…

Flutter Swirls:

The black corner pieces are cut from the swirl background - if you look closely you can see additional matting on the pieces from my original “vision”. The background behind Flutter is a swirl stamped with Pretty in Pink and Cool Caribbean. I then added the white and black line work. Oh, yes, sponging - I sponge ink on almost all of my cards…

Monday, April 28, 2008

Yes, you may use any ISC sheets must be ISC stamps only! A random email address will be chosen end of each month and you'll recv 1 FREE ISC stamp sheet of your CHOICE! This will be a monthly drawing! Post your link with your design and remember DO NOT to enter anonymously!! Have fun!ends: 5/2/08

Yesterday I went with a group of friends to a rubber stamping convention here in NE Ohio. We had a great time! We left with sore feet, lighter wallets, heavy bags and new ideas! We even met Shelly (blog: http://stampwithshelly.blogspot.com/ a.k.a. papermoon04 on SCS). I have been a big fan of her work for a while and it was a thrill to meet her in person!

There were more than 60 vendors at this show - talk about making your head spin!!! I like to go - yes, because of the new rubber *snort* but also the ideas - either new ones or ones that I have not used in a while. Today’s card was inspired by the latter…

Resist Time- Front:

Second Fold:

Inside:

On all of the images on this card I used crayon resist - it’s a fun, easy technique:Start with Glossy PaperStamp your image (allow dry time!)Color with a white crayon the areas that you want to stay whiteSponge on your colorWipe with a paper towel

Do you know what Gesso is? If not, it’s a liquid sealer that is commonly used to prime painter’s canvas. It is readily available in most craft stores either in the painting supply section (large bottle) or with the small acrylic paints (small bottle ) The Gesso on this tag serves two purposes - gives some texture to the tag and it seals the tag. The Gesso was applied with an old room key (the plastic ones that looks like a credit card). Play with the Gesso and get a texture that you like - the sky is the limit. You can use one coat or multiple layers depending on the look you want.The sealing property of Gesso allows your inks to stay their true color. If you have ever worked with a manila office tags you are familiar with how it darkens the color of your ink. You could also partially cover your tag with Gesso to give it a grungier look.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

I am back from my crop and I had a fabulous time… Nothing like being a small group of stampers in a large group of scrappers… Oh and the shopping - we hit 3 local stamping stores!!! I did not get anything totally finished but I made some great progress and I hope to be sharing two different mini albums in the next week or so…

I wanted to share a Springy (is that a word?) card with you today that includes two of my favorite techniques - brayered sky and polished stone. If you check out some of the cards that Zindorf posts on SCS you will see a wide variety of absolutely gorgeous brayered sky cards.

Here is mine - Flutter Sunrise:

This is a tent topper card. The large butterfly is a stamp from Innovative Stamp Creations ( http://www.innovativestampcreations.com/ ) that is a full, two winged, butterfly (like the smaller butterflies at the bottom of the card). I embossed the butterfly twice on polished stone glossy cardstock and then cut her out and cut off the bottom wing and tentacle. The duplicate wing was placed behind the front wing and body. I then bent the front wing to give the illusion of flight.

The three smaller butterflies were also stamped on polished stone and placed on scraps of the brayered sky paper with the cracked background stamp.

One more picture that I wanted to share today - not stamp related but a true work of art! While I was gone at the crop my weeping cherry bloomed! Nothing in my garden had spring blooms before I left.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

I love all the swirls/flourishes available today and the swirl used on this card is no exception! If you look closely at the card you will see that I used the same swirl in two different ways - horizontally on acetate and on the panel behind the bird with pink ink and bleach (this is beautiful IRL… I hated to cover it… hmmmm, an idea for another card).

The bird was inked with VersaMark, sponged with Choc Chip and clear embossed on Perhaps Basic Grey paper. The bird was also stamped on the River Rock panel to give the appearance of a shadow. The ribbon that the bird is carrying says "Forever Friends".

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

After working with bleach last week I thought I would play with it just a little more. I created two very different looking cards both using flowers and bleach.

Bleached Tulips:

This background was created with ink direct to paper on white CS. Direct to paper is simply rubbing your ink pad across your paper.

Bleached Daisies:

This background was created by sponging ink on Barely Banana CS, stamping small brown flower and then bleaching with the daisy.

A few comments about using bleach:Create your own stamp pad with an old dish and paper towelsWhen bleaching Card Stock - test first, reaction to bleach variesDoes not work on most designer paper because it’s coated/sealedWill bleach out dye based inks (I’ve used SU and Ranger Distressed Inks)I washed my stamps under running water (I did not want to bleach my stamp scrubber)

Flowers stamped with Choc Chip InkFlowers only Gamsol with Prismacolor pencilsBackground around the flowers water colored with w/c crayonsDragonfly stamped on AcetateMagnify frame Embossed on designer paperAdded to card with dimensionals

Sunday, April 13, 2008

I wanted to play with one of the new background stamps from Innovative Stamp Creations ( http://www.innovativestampcreations.com/ ). This background stamp is a little different from what I typically use - it’s a modern style. I thought it would be fun to play with this stamp with two of the newer techniques that I have drooled over lately but have not had the chance to try. The results are two very different cards…

This technique is from Tim Holtz’s April tag and it featured pattern paper, embossing and acrylic paint. For this technique I used regular acrylic paints and a sponge brush which worked fabulously.

The background paper before embossing and painting:

“Cherish” and “Journey” were stamped using the faux metal technique and “the” is behind a Tim Holtz fragment One more nice touch on this card that you probably can‘t see in the picture is the sewn stitching with copper thread. Here is a link to Tim’s tag/directions: http://timholtz.typepad.com/my_weblog/2008/04/april-technique.html

A few details - the flower and butterfly are Prismacolor and gamsol, beads are added to the “book binding“. The flower image is only half of what is on the stamp - I cut half of it off to show more of the background paper. There are a lot of layers/dimensionals on this card.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

I love this layout - the long/tall cards make you think differently than the A2 or square cards… This one is similar to the Spring Birdie card that I did for my MIL’s birthday. I was sad parting with that card so I thought I’d make a similar one but with different stamps!

One of the stamps that I ardor on this card is the garden silhouette that comes in the Flair of Summer set from Innovative Stamp Creations ( http://www.innovativestampcreations.com/ ). This stamp is sized perfectly to fit on an A2 card. For this layout I used only one side of the stamp on each panel. I placed scotch tape on the portion of the stamp that I did not want on my paper, inked the stamp, removed the tape and then - viola - perfect stamped image!

The flower and the bird were created using the Tole Technique (stamped multiple times, cut out and placed on dimensionals). Also - the bird is a solid image stamp - I kissed the inked stamp with the flower vine stamp to remove some of the ink and stamped the bird on Pretty in Pink CS.

I looked at this challenge late last night and thought….huh - Offset Oval - I’m not too sure about this… But this morning I thought about all my new Butterfly images from Innovative Stamp Creations ( http://www.innovativestampcreations.com/ ) and decided that Flutter wants to fly since the weather is sooo nice!

Wonky Flutter:

There are 5 different butterflies stamped on this card. On the background paper there are line images stamped with Stazon. The main focal butterfly stamped on white CS, colored with Prismacolor pencils and Gamsol. The flowers were all cut from the background paper. The blue oval is white core so I ran it through my Cuttlebug and sanded it. I added a few buttons and half pearls just to “pretty it up”.

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Ahhhhh…. New stamps - nothing is better than playing with new stamps!!! Except maybe the weather the last four days… high 60’s to 70’s… best weather in NE Ohio since last October - you know - like Halloween - that was 6 holidays ago…

I love the image of the girl with the flowing hair found in the Friendships set. All the elements of this card were stamped on a 8.5 x 11 sheet of white CS that I misted (see the mist colors below).

The flowers on the vertical panel were stamped in different spots on the paper, cut out and placed on dimensionals. On the center of the flowers I added Sepia Accents (Ranger) gloss medium.

The horizontal panel is from Textures, Background & Sentiments set. This piece was clear embossed and then brayered with Choc Chip ink to make the flowers pop.

This layout may look kinda familiar - I got the idea of the circle and vertical panels from this weekends VSN on SCS (I added the horizontal panel). I didn’t participate in the VSN… Why, you ask? Well the time limit to create a card is 45 minutes - I just can’t seem to create a card that I am happy with in that timeframe. But if you take a look at the challenges you can get a lot of different ideas!!!

The last two sketch challenges on SCS had you using thin (1.5”) panels as your primary focus. The sketch last week really made me think “what can I possibly do on that thin of a panel”. This week I was happy to see another thin panel challenge! I am finding that I really like this type of layout… So I think “Thin is In” - at least with card sketches *snort*!

This card is very similar to yesterday’s card - same color palette, flower images and inks. The primary difference is the layout, designer paper and I replaced the bird with the butterfly. The butterfly was made with 3 layers for Basic Grey Lilly Kate paper - she also has Stickles on her wings to give her a little spring glimmer!

If you want to know more about the background panels see yesterday’s card.

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

This is a Birthday card for my Mother-in-law - she will be… well I better not say, she likes me and I want it to stay that way! She likes flowers and birds so I am hoping she will enjoy this card!

Spring Birdie:

One of my favorite stampers on SCS is Markie’s Mom - she writes about how she creates some of her fabulous cards in 30 minutes… 30 minutes??? I don’t know how long it takes me but it’s way longer than 30 minutes…

So, you guessed it, I timed this one and I completed it in 30 minutes times 8 - yep…translation 4 HOURS!I loved every minute of it but I am jealous that I can’t create a beautiful work of art in 30 minutes… If you would like to see some of Markie’s Mom’s fantastic work here is her blog -> http://stampinwithmarkiesmom.blogspot.com/

The overall dimension of this card is 9 x 4 and it will fit in a business sized envelope. Here are some of the details of the background panels (hmmmm hint of why it too so long???):

This one’s involved (LOL) -> Barely Banana CS, stamped Sanded background with VersaMark twice in different directions, sponged edges with Pretty in Pink, stamped brown boarder, added more sponging of Pretty in Pink, distressed, sewed with zigzag and straight stitch (hand tied and taped on the back so they will not fray)

For the flowers I inked direct to paper on Very Vanilla CS with Pretty in Pink and Barely Banana - when I applied the ink I did not go for full coverage - this adds some dimension to the flower background. The yellow layers were clear embossed, pink and green were sponged with some brown and I applied Jelly Roll clear pen to add some shine. Added dimensionals to the layers of the flowers.

About Me

Actually my name is Kathy A Tucker but I like KAT for short. I am addicted to stamps, techniques and grunge - if you haven't guessed - I am a HUGE fan of Tim Holtz!
I live in the woods in NE Ohio and can be found most days making a mess in my studio.